Forum:War of Power
Having read the books a number of times, and the contents of the wiki, I have fount a number of disagreements I have about the timeline of the war of power. I wish to suggest that the war of power took place over a much longer period of time. It is evident that Aes Sedai can live for upwards of 400 years. Rand states that he was 400 years old when he died, and to the best of my knowlege he was in the prime of his life. His death was due to his madness, not old age. Given that we can surmise that the Aes Sedai of the Age of Legends could live even longer. This is dueto the power, and their ability to heal. I am also of the opinion that some of this longevity was given to their servants the Aeil. In fact, Jonai is the only one who has his actual age given: "He was sixty-three, in the prime of his life, not yet old enough for gray hairs" (WOT:TSR p.427). His eldest son Willim is at this moment stated bo be 15. This is all given to suggest that a generation of Aeil is in fact not 20-25 years, but in fact 50-60 years. GIven this the timeline of the war itself would be closer to 150-200 years. This greater time span si also colaborated by the story of Coumin, the father of Jonai. Coumin had a definite idea about the time that the war ahd lasted. "Coumin could not imagine such a world; the war had been old when he was born"(WOT:TSR p.432). This fact reveals some information when compared with the opinions of his father's grandfather Charn: "Coumin did not like the way citizens looked a Charn when he said taht Lanfear had not always been evil"(WOT:TSR p.432). These two glimpses into the mind of a man who saw the war of Power end suggest that at least 3 generation had changed between the start of the war, and its end. Adding to this my suggestion of the longevity of the Aeil, I feel that I have ample evidence to suggest that the conflic known as the War of Power was Quite a long conflict. My timeline also gives room for the Forsaken to act freely throughout the war itself. From evidense given to us the managed to each rule a large section of teritory, setting up a society that they wished. I wish to suggest that much of the war as I see it, was more of a stalemate, where neither side actually had much agressive action towards the other. and the 10 year war, was in fact the end of this great space of time, where the forces of the light began to move against the Shadow, as actual massive armies, rather then as a set of border scirmishes. This seems to me to be a much more realistic model of the time preceeding the Breaking. as a final quick note, fe other conflict in this world seem to be of such small scale as 10 years. The Trolloc Wars are ntoed as being 350 years long, the Breaking is 250 or so, and Hunderd Years War were no small conflics. My statement of the exact time following the final 10 years, is jsut a suggestion, it may be longer or shorted, I simply with to address the fact that any reconstruciton of the war period meeds to include space for the forsaken to have acted, and perpatrated all the attrocities they are said to have commited. Oleg Actually, the length of time between Charn and Coumin is the span of time separating the drilling of the Bore from the end of the War of Power, not the time between the beginning and ending of the war. As soon as the drilling of the Bore occurred, society began to change and break down, Aes Sedai began to go over to the shadow as forsaken and the world 'relearned the word called War'. This time period is called the Collapse - and is generally considered to be around or at least a century. This is the time you're looking for to account for many of the forsaken's atrocities. It was the end of the Collapse that the War of Power broke out and that war is stated in a couple of places by folks who were in it as being 10 years. It is so much more condensed than later wars simply because the wholesale destruction that could be caused by forces of light and shadow were much more extensive back then. What's truly tragic, and RJ shows this well, is the changes in society that were wrought over so short a span of years as even a century of collapse - you start with the average Aes Sedai lifespan being 700 years or more and the average non-channeler's lifespan being 150-200 years or more; Ter Angreal are as integrated into the lives of all citizens are plumbing, fiber optics and shoddy cell phone reception are in ours and early in the hostilities, fighting was done with armored vehicles and energy weapons. but by the end of the conflict (whether you consider the 10 year war or the century of collapse), lifespans for non channelers were much closer to medieval peasants, the war was fought on horseback with swords and bows and Ter Angreal were becoming rare enough you could hoard the remaining ones into a couple of big piles to be hauled off by a single caravan. Our ability to destroy ourselves is truly awe inspiring in a stunning horrible kinda way. ~Humite